A Beautiful World

From time to time I go walking. Rarely is there a preconceived starting point and, even more rarely, is there a destination. I just go, to go. I don’t do this as much as I would like, but I am doing it more than I used to.

Photography is an amazing thing when done correctly. The camera gives you the ability to show people things that they have looked at a thousand times, but have never seen. All it takes is the eye to see something and the heart to want to capture it in a way that most people never have.

I believe the heart of any image is in the details. Maybe it’s the eyes. Maybe it’s the clothes that were picked to contrast the background perfectly. Maybe it is the peeling paint that you can almost flick of the picture. The way I try to get those details to come through is by looking at the scene before I even take the picture and think, “What can I do different from the next 100 photographers to come to this spot?”

Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. I think it works here. I came upon an old street. I could have shot the street, but I decided to shoot one of the soldiers that has stood guard over this street for many years. My hope is that when people look at this shot, they are drawn into the abuse this hydrant has endured. The rust, the peeling paint.....

When you look at this, you know it isn’t on a nice street. You can imagine what kind of street it’s on. You can imagine it because you have been on that kind of street a thousand times. You have been on that street but have never bothered to stop and see it, much less take a camera out.

Maybe I give myself too much credit. Maybe everyone will say, “Hey moron, that’s just a fire hydrant.” Maybe they will, but I don’t care. It documents a day that I saw what was around me and I like it.

“So successful has been the camera’s role in beautifying the world that photographs, rather than the world, have become the standard of beautiful” - Susan Sontag